


write our names in the wet concrete

by koshiroganes



Category: Voltron: Legendary Defender
Genre: M/M, Some angst but mostly fluff, florist shiro, modern day AU, tattoo artist keith
Language: English
Status: In-Progress
Published: 2018-04-09
Updated: 2018-04-09
Packaged: 2019-04-20 17:39:02
Rating: Teen And Up Audiences
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 1
Words: 4,346
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/14266224
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/koshiroganes/pseuds/koshiroganes
Summary: "Shiro’s flower shop is situated on the sleepiest block of a busy downtown, and he likes it this way. It’s quiet here, and across the street from his shopfront is a little patch of grass and a little Japanese maple tree. Shiro lives in the studio apartment over the shop, and so he always has a view of that tree, day and night—he watches it change from vibrant green to deepest red as the seasons change and thinks of home."After losing his arm in the Air Force, Shiro buys a flower shop. Keith's tattoo shop moves in next door, and Shiro comes back out of the shell he's built around himself, little by little.





	write our names in the wet concrete

Chapter 1

 

Shiro’s flower shop is situated on the sleepiest block of a busy downtown, and he likes it this way. It’s quiet here, and across the street from his shopfront is a little patch of grass and a little Japanese maple tree. Shiro lives in the studio apartment over the shop, and so he always has a view of that tree, day and night—he watches it change from vibrant green to deepest red as the seasons change and thinks of home.

 

He gets his fair share of business—mostly from people who find him online, or businessmen who spot his store as they leave the bank across the street and come in search of an apology bouquet for their wives. He has his regulars, and these are his favorites—the ones who understand his need for quiet.

 

It’s slow in the shop the day the sign goes up next door. He’s putting the finishing touches on an arrangement, an example centerpiece he’ll show to the bride and groom who have an appointment later, when the noise starts, heavy thumps and shouting.

 

It’s muffled inside the shop and he can’t make out what they’re yelling, and his instincts kick in—fight, never flight, flight has been trained out of him—but when he goes to the glass window that spans the front of the store, he sees a man on a ladder holding a sign above the shopfront, another man and a woman at the base shouting up instructions.

 

His chest unclenches, but then he reads the sign—”Legendary Body Art” in block letters, with “Tattoos and Piercings” smaller underneath—and… well. If he could pick the kind of business to be his neighbor, a tattoo shop wouldn’t be at the top of his list.  He’d never say it out loud—politeness is still as ingrained in him as standing with his back straight—but this is the kind of thing that could drive away a good chunk of his customer base, the old ladies and the wealthy engaged couples. So he worries, a little.

 

He worries the day the sign goes up and he worries as the weeks pass, as Legendary Body Art opens and their quiet block gets a kind of traffic it’s never seen before. Sometimes, they stop into the shop, and Shiro sells them his most colorful arrangements, ones that usually get passed over in favor of roses and tulips: Funny-shaped orchids, forget-me-nots, Birds of Paradise and flowering stones. Shiro talks to them about the flowers and where they come from, and in return they show off their new ink and piercings.

 

At first, it makes Shiro want to fold in on himself, board up the doors of the shop and lay in his bed and watch the leaves of the Japanese maple change, his constant and only companion. He doesn’t, though. Somehow, he doesn’t.

 

One afternoon in October, when the sun starting to stream in from the west and the leaves of the maple are red and dripping like blood, the doorbell over the shop rings and Shiro looks up from the cash register to see the man who stood on the ladder almost two months ago. He’s broad and brown-skinned and grinning, a tray of cookies propped on one arm.

 

He waves at Shiro and approaches the counter, and as he gets closer Shiro notices his piercings—big discs in his earlobes, a stack of rings through his nose and studs in each nostril, opals above and below his lips, and that’s not half. Most of these Shiro doesn’t have names for; some he’d never expect a person to want as a piercing at all. But he’s gotten used to this lately, so he just smiles back and says, “Welcome to Shirogane Floral Design. What can I help you with?”

 

“Hey,” the man says and sets the tray of cookies down on the counter. “I’m Hunk, I’m one of the piercers over at Legendary. Thought I’d bring over some treats and introduce myself so you don’t think we’re a bunch of rude delinquents.”

 

“I didn’t,” Shiro says seriously, even though it was definitely supposed to be a joke. “You’ve been great neighbors so far.” It’s true—Legendary Body Art isn’t especially noisy, even though they’re open until midnight, and Shiro would know. His walls are thin enough that sometimes he hears the low hum of the tattoo guns.

 

“Thanks, man. You have too—pretty cool to be next door to a flower shop. We’re all artists, you know?”

 

Shiro has never thought about it that way, even though he’s come to see tattooing and even piercing—the careful placement, the intricate jewelry—as an artform more and more in the last couple of months. He also would never have thought a piercer would think of _him_ as an artist.

 

“Try a cookie,” Hunk says eagerly, pushing the tray closer to Shiro. “They’re the best you’ve ever had, I guarantee it or your money back.”

 

Shiro doesn’t bother saying that he didn’t pay for the cookies. He bites into one, and his eyes fall shut. He fights back a moan. “Wow,” he says when he swallows, and Hunk flashes him a thumbs up.

 

“Told ya, dude. Hey, will you help me pick something out for the shop? I wanna brighten it up in there.”

 

“Sure,” Shiro says. “What are you looking for?”

 

“Oh, man, I don’t know anything about flower arrangements and stuff—uh, how about… I know we have some regulars who’ve been in here and they love your stuff, what do they like?”

 

Shiro purses his lips in thought and glances around the store. His eyes fall on an arrangement of different colored calla lilies, and he rounds the counter, leads Hunk to it. “This one?” he asks, nodding to the calla lilies.

 

“These are perfect, man,” Hunk says, brushing a thumb over a delicate pink petal. “You’ve got a serious eye. Allura’s gonna love these. What do I owe you?”

 

“Oh,” Shiro says. “They’re on the house. As thanks for the cookies.”

 

“Sweet. Thanks—uh, what’s your name?”

 

“Shiro. Everyone calls me Shiro.” _Called_ , his brain supplies. People called him Shiro, back when he still talked to people.

 

“Thanks, Shiro. I’ll see you around, yeah?”

 

Shiro nods, and Hunk breezes out with the vase of lilies in hand. Shiro expects that to be the end of it, but then Hunk comes back the next week to get more flowers, and the next, and the next, always armed with a supply of baked goods he exchanges for a fresh arrangement.

 

The second week of December, though, on a snowy Tuesday when the shop is completely dead, Hunk doesn’t come in.

 

The bell rings as the door opens, and Shiro looks up, expecting to see Hunk. It isn’t Hunk—the man in front of him is paler and more slender, rubbing whipcord-strong arms against the cold. The tattoos climbing up his neck and covering his arms, plus the fact that he’s not wearing a coat in December, tell Shiro he came from next door.

 

“Hi,” Shiro says. “How can I help you?”

 

“Warm in here,” the man says in lieu of a greeting. “‘S freezing in our shop right now.”

 

“For the plants,” Shiro says. “It gets awful in the summer.”

 

“Nice now, though.” The man shakes snow out of his ink black hair and stomps his combat boots on the welcome mat. “Uh, Hunk is sick today, he wanted me to come get our flowers. He said he’ll bring you your orange brioche rolls as soon as he’s feeling better. I told him I could just give you cash.”

 

“I’ll take the rolls,” Shiro says with a smile, “but thanks.”

 

“I guess I forget that not everyone is sick of being stuffed with baked goods every day.” The man glances around the shop. “Does Hunk usually pick something out himself…? I don’t really know what he’d go for.”

 

“I have something ready,” Shiro says. Over the weeks he’s started coming up with an arrangement he thinks Hunk will like, which he keeps behind the counter until Hunk arrives. He doesn’t do this for all his regular customers, but then, Hunk is the only one that lets him get really creative. The bouquet of sunflowers he sells to Mrs. Jackson every week doesn’t have quite the same flair.

 

The man walks hesitant to the desk and peers at the flowers, cockleshell orchids and baby’s breath and a couple long, thin branches clipped from the bare Japanese maple across the street. The purple of the orchids matches his eyes, which flash from darkest blue to violet in the right light. Shiro tries not to stare at them, but with the man’s attention on the flowers, it’s hard not to.

 

The man looks up at Shiro then, studying him. “Aren’t these arrangements usually pretty expensive? Why are you trading them for free for cinnamon rolls that cost Hunk, like, five bucks to make? I feel like there’s a serious profit loss here.”

 

Shiro laughs. “I don’t know. It seems like a fair trade, for a friend. And I think putting them in your shop has actually given me more business.”

 

“Wouldn’t expect our crowd to be buying flowers,” he murmurs. “Uh, not that… I mean, we do like having them a lot. They’re interesting.”

 

“Thanks,” Shiro says. “What’s your name?”

 

“Oh. Keith.”

 

“Shiro,” Shiro says, holding a hand out.

 

Keith takes it and says, “I know. Hunk talks about you a lot.”

 

“Yeah?”

 

“Mostly about how you’re a creative genius,” Keith says with a grin, just a brief flash of white teeth. “But he also says you seem like a really good guy.”

 

“He’s a good guy too,” Shiro says. “Creative genius, though. I don’t know about that.”

 

Keith huffs a laugh. “Do you know how many people have walked into the shop wanting a tattoo, seen one of your flower arrangements, and just went, ‘never mind, I want that. Tattoo that on me.’ At least three. Allura is great at florals so she always takes those clients.”

 

Shiro stares at him. “People have gotten tattoos of my flowers?”

 

“Oh, yeah. They’re on Allura’s portfolio on our website if you want to check them out. I’ve sketched a couple of them too.”

 

Shiro pictures this—Keith bent over a sketchbook, pencil in hand, dark hair flopping onto the page and his teeth worrying his lip. He swallows. “I’ll definitely look. What’s the website?”

 

—

 

After he closes up shop for the evening, Shiro makes his way upstairs and starts dinner, propping his laptop up on his small kitchen counter as he pulls a pan of marinating chicken from the fridge and turns the oven on to preheat.

 

He scrolls through the Legendary website, clicking first on Allura’s portfolio. Pride floods warm in his veins the couple times he sees one of his arrangements reproduced in ink. Her style is beautiful, flowing and splattered like a watercolor painting—but his fingers start to itch, and he leaves Allura’s page, finds Keith’s.

 

It’s half tattoos and half scans of sketchbook pages, and true to his word there are several charcoal drawings of Shiro’s flowers. They’re the exact opposite of Allura’s work but just as lovely, the color all stripped away, leaving just the shapes represented in grayscale. Shiro has never seen them like this—in one of the sketches, Keith has shaded the area around the flower in black and gray, shaping the flower in the negative space.

 

His style is more traditional than Allura’s but still bursting with color. Shiro sees sprawling landscapes painted across backs, collages of intricate black and white wrapping around arms, vibrant portraits on thighs.

 

His breath catches at the Japanese maple. It’s one of the earlier images in Keith’s portfolio and the only painting, done in acrylics, Shiro thinks—the red of the leaves is so solid and deep, the lines of the branches so delicate. He looks out his window at the bare maple shivering in the wind, runs the thumb of his human hand over the leaves on the screen.

 

Shiro goes to bed still thinking of blue-violet eyes and blood-red paint.

 

—

 

Hunk brings the brioche rolls two days later, and Keith still hasn’t left Shiro’s mind as he chews on soft, fluffy bread and tangy orange icing that night. Tomorrow is Friday. Shiro has looked at Legendary’s website enough times to have Keith’s schedule memorized—Friday through Tuesday, three to ten.

 

Shiro closes the shop at the normal time Friday evening, but instead of heading upstairs to his apartment after he strips off his apron and gardening gloves, he shrugs on a coat and leaves through the front door. Tugs the handle to make sure it’s locked. Looks up at the Legendary Body Art sign. Steels himself.

 

He doesn’t remember the last time he looked at another person and felt magnetized like this, if it’s ever happened at all.

 

He walks the short distance to the front door of Legendary and pushes inside. The first thing he notices is the flower arrangement he gave to Keith, practically showcased like a trophy on a shelf next to the counter. Gold and silver and precious gems glitter inside glass cases, patrons leaning down to gaze at them, or flipping through portfolios on the long, plush couches.

 

Hunk is behind the counter along with another man Shiro doesn’t recognize—no Keith in sight—and he grins when he sees Shiro, calls out, “Hey, man! Fancy seeing you in here.”

 

“Hey,” Shiro replies and crosses the room to the counter.

 

“Lance, this is Shiro, our most esteemed personal florist,” Hunk says to the other guy. “Shiro, Lance. He’s one of our piercers. You here to let me stick you with a needle?”

 

“You’d rock a daith, man,” Lance says. “You look like a guy who doesn’t want a bunch of metal in your face. Hunk here will try to talk you into a Monroe or some shit, but I could do a _sick_ ear project—”

 

“Lance, shut up,” Hunk says good-naturedly.

 

“I really just got curious,” Shiro says, and it’s not a lie, mostly. He _is_ curious about the shop—he’s just more curious about Keith. “Not, uh, not sure I’d go for a piercing, though, if I were to get anything. Maybe a tattoo?”

 

“It’d hurt,” Lance says in a stage whisper. “You’re like two percent body fat, you get a tattoo anywhere it’s gonna be right on muscle. Piercings? One stick and you’re done. Doesn’t even hurt.”

 

“Lance, Christ,” Hunk says, laughing. “Don’t you have somewhere to be?”

 

“You’re right,” Lance says. “I’m supposed to be watching Allura tattoo that guy with the hair.”

 

“I meant _helping customers_ ,” Hunk calls after Lance as he stalks away, but Lance just throws up a hand, middle finger raised, without looking back. Hunk shakes his head. “You serious about that tattoo? We could get you a consultation. I think Keith is free right now.”

 

“Ah—I—”

 

“Yo, Keith!” Hunk yells over his shoulder, and Shiro swallows, nervous for no reason that makes even a little bit of sense.

 

Keith appears from the back then, longish hair pulled back into a ponytail and a red leather jacket tied around his waist. “What’s up? Oh. Hey, man.”

 

Shiro’s eyes meet Keith’s. “Hi,” he says, throat dry, and god, this is _so absurd_.

 

“Shiro wants a tattoo,” Hunk says without preamble. “Think you could hook him up?” And then he _winks_ at Keith, and Shiro will probably spend the next week at least deciphering what _that_ was about.

 

“Uh,” Keith says. “Sure, yeah. What were you think about getting?”

 

“I wasn’t… really,” Shiro says. He scratches the back of his neck, eyes cast down at the countertop. If Keith tattooed him—having Keith’s hands on him, for hours. It could be disastrous. “It was just an idea.”

 

“That’s cool,” Keith says with a shrug, but he won’t meet Shiro’s eyes. “I’ll be here if you change your mind.” He nods to Hunk and turns, and Shiro catches sight of a tree branch covered in red leaves crawling up Keith’s back.

 

Inspiration strikes.

 

“Wait,” he says, and Keith turns back to him, one eyebrow raised. Shiro’s lungs might collapse before he manages to get the words out.

 

“Yeah?”

 

“The tree you painted on your portfolio,” he says. “Do you think you could tattoo that on me?”

 

—

 

Shiro drops a deposit of a hundred dollars and leaves the shop with an appointment card for tomorrow night sitting heavy in his wallet and the promise that Keith will draw up the tattoo tonight. Hunk reassured him that it doesn’t hurt that much, but Shiro’s no stranger to pain. He’s more worried about Keith—and, a little, about the fact that he just made a snap decision to permanently alter his body.

 

But it’s not like it’s the first time _that’s_ happened either.

 

Shiro spends his weekends in his office, catching up on paperwork and ordering supplies while Pidge tends to the shop. It was Matt’s idea, so she could earn a little extra cash and do something at least peripherally related to her geology major, but she’s good at it, and she’s the only person he’ll trust with the shop.

 

Shiro suspects Matt also suggested his sister work in the shop to keep Shiro company, but he hasn’t asked, and Matt wouldn’t tell him the truth if he did.

 

At five, he locks up his office and finds Pidge behind the front counter, leaning back in a chair with a textbook open in front of her and a sheet of math homework balanced on top. “I might head out early,” he says. “Mind closing up for me?”

 

“You’ve never let me close by myself before,” Pidge says, one suspicious eyebrow raised. “Do you have _plans_ , Shiro?”

 

He sighs. “Promise me you won’t tell your brother. I’ll never hear the end of it.”

 

“Sounds juicy. You got it.”

 

“I’m going next door,” he says. Pauses. “To get a tattoo.”

 

Pidge busts out laughing. “Oh my god, are you serious?”

 

“Completely.”

 

“Yeah, you’re right, Matt _wouldn’t_ let you hear the end of it. You realize this gives me blackmail material on you for the rest of your life, right?”

 

“Okay, kid, that’s enough,” Shiro says and cuffs her lightly on the head. “I’ll have my phone, call me if anything comes up.”

 

“Well, as you can see, business is hopping,” Pidge says, waving a hand around at the empty shop, and then goes back to her math homework. Shiro shakes his head and heads outside, turns into the alcove that arches over the door to Legendary.

 

The appointment card burns in his wallet, scribbled on in Keith’s sloping handwriting, blank ink smudged. It’s tucked away but Shiro can see it because he spent last night studying it, wondering what the hell he was doing.

 

He somehow makes himself go inside, and he chats with Hunk at the counter as he waits for Keith to get everything set up. It’s comfortable here in a way he never would’ve expected of a place so far _out_ of his comfort zone, but then, looking around—he’s not the only one with the past written on his skin. The people here highlight theirs with ink and metal instead of hiding it, like Shiro has spent most of his adult life doing.

 

Keith ducks his head out of a little room in the back and waves Shiro in, so Shiro rounds the counter and follows him, squeezing into the small space. “You can sit there,” Keith says, nodding at what looks like a dentist’s chair. He won’t meet Shiro’s eyes.

 

Shiro sits. He fits, barely.

 

Keith drops onto a rolling chair and grabs a tablet from a countertop. “Uh, so. This is the outline. I tried to keep it pretty close to the painting since you said you liked it so much, but if there’s anything you don’t like we can change it. It has to go on your body forever.”

 

Shiro stares at the image on the tablet. It’s just black on white right now, but he can picture it, has seen the color work Keith does in his portfolio. “No, it’s perfect.”

 

“Cool. Like I said yesterday, it’s big so I think this’ll take a couple sessions. We can do the outline today and see how you feel.”

 

“Sure,” Shiro says.

 

“All right. I’m gonna go print this on transfer paper, so just hang out for a minute. You can take your shirt off if you want.” Keith coughs. “Since it’s. Going on your back.”

 

“Right.”

 

Keith leaves the room, and Shiro strips his t-shirt over his head, hunches forward in the chair to at least make an effort at hiding the worst of the scars littering his chest and stomach. His back isn’t as bad—the blast that blew his arm clean off hit him from the front. But that won’t keep Keith from asking, or at least wondering. It’d be stupid to think it would. His metal arm is impossible to miss.

 

When Keith returns, he has Shiro turn so he’s facing the back of his seat with his chest pressed against it. It’s better, now that Keith’s turned around, now that Shiro can’t see the blue of his eyes and the fall of his hair across forehead. It’s also worse.

 

“All right,” Keith says, his voice low. “Stay still for me.”

 

Shiro holds his breath. Keith presses the transfer paper to his back and then peels it away. “Looks good,” he says. “Check it out in the mirror, make sure you like the placement.”

 

Keith holds up a hand mirror behind Shiro while he looks into the one hanging on the wall. It’s dead center on his back, the trunk stretching down his spine and the leaves full across his shoulder blades.  “That’s good,” Shiro says. “It’s perfect.”

 

“Cool. Go ahead and sit back down and I’ll get everything ready.”

 

Shiro complies, straddling the chair again and leaning his forehead against the headrest. “This your first tattoo?” Keith asks as he works. Shiro cranes his neck around to see him. Keith squeezes black ink into tiny cups, then tears open the packaging on a new tattoo gun.

 

“Yeah,” Shiro says. “Any tips?”

 

“It’s not all that painful,” Keith says. He shrugs. “Not the outline, at least. Coloring’s the worst part. Just breathe through it. Keeping my canvas distracted isn’t my strongest suit, but that helps.”

 

Keith will keep him plenty distracted, he’s sure. “Got it.”

 

The tattoo gun hums to life. “Ready?”

 

Shiro nods. The first touch of the needle to his skin is light, a fingernail scratch, and he lets his shoulders relax. This isn’t so bad. And he’s pressed into a seat, so even if he has a reaction to Keith’s bare arm bracing against his back, Keith won’t know.

 

“So,” Keith says, after five minutes of quiet, besides the muffled din of the shop outside and the buzz of the gun. “Why does a florist need to be this jacked?”

 

That startles a laugh out of Shiro. “Uh, I used to be in the Air Force, until—the arm. Now it’s habit, mostly. Keeps me busy.”

 

“Hell of a career change.”

 

“I like it,” Shiro says. “It’s calm. How’d you get into doing tattoos?”

 

“Always liked drawing. Got my first tattoo when I was fifteen and just kept getting them. I started my apprenticeship when I was eighteen, met Hunk and Allura through that, and—yeah. Now we have a shop.”

 

“So you’re an owner?”

 

“Basically, yeah.” Keith pauses his cat-scratching at Shiro’s back to dip the gun into the ink. Shiro winces as he digs back in with it. “Any reason you wanted the tree? It’s fine if it’s just that you liked it, it doesn’t have to be some deep reason.”

 

“I don’t know if it’s deep,” Shiro says. “It reminds me of Japan. I live over the flower shop so I have a view of it all the time, and it’s comforting, I guess. I haven’t been back to Japan since I came to the States.”

 

Shiro’s talking more to Keith than he has to anyone in what feels like years, but there’s something about him that’s relaxing. Like Keith won’t judge him for anything that comes out of his mouth right now. Shiro likes that—and he likes that he’s turned away from Keith, so if the look of pity Matt gets sometimes crosses his face, Shiro can’t see it.

 

“Ever think about going back?”

 

“Not much to go back to,” Shiro says. He left because everything holding him there was gone—here he has the shop, and the Holts, and it doesn’t feel like much sometimes—it doesn’t feel like they need him to stay—but it’s enough to keep him getting up in the morning.

 

They fall into silence as Keith works and Shiro relaxes into the consistency of the pain. He chokes back a grunt as Keith drags the needle over one of his scars, and Keith says, “Sorry. It’s worse on scar tissue. Should’ve warned you.”

 

“It’s okay,” Shiro says. “I don’t mind pain.”

 

Keith wipes away ink and blood, lines his skin with the needle, dips it into the ink pots, a steady rhythm Shiro becomes used to as an hour passes, then two. Fingers swipe across his back and Shiro can picture them, long and thin and callused, deft and capable.

 

“Think we’re done,” Keith says finally. “Give it a few weeks to heal and we’ll add color. Lemme know what you think.”

 

Shiro peers at his back in the mirror. His eyes go wide. Black lines sprawl across his back, his shoulders, intricate and sweeping, bold and delicate. His skin looks… transformed. For the first time in years Shiro is looking at himself and he doesn’t want to look away.

 

He catches Keith’s eyes in the mirror. “Thank you,” he says softly. Keith just nods, like he understands, and Shiro thinks he actually might.

**Author's Note:**

> i don't know where this fic is going right now but come hang out with me on [tumblr!](http://www.koshiroganes.tumblr.com)


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